Technology is to be credited for countless changes in our world since our grandparents, or even
parents, were children. People with disabilities have benefitted especially from the marvels
wrought by technology.

Fifty years ago, a deaf person could communicate only with friends and family in physical
proximity, and even then, communication was defined by the sign-language proficiency of the hearing
person or the availability of pen and paper. Today, a person who is deaf can talk to anyone
in the world, given a cell phone or laptop.

Fifty years ago, if you used a wheelchair, you didn’t go very far if you didn’t have the
upper-body strength to propel your own chair. Today, motorized wheelchairs designed for every
lifestyle, from zipping across town to navigating more-rugged natural turf, make mobility a
personal choice.

Thanks to technology, people without speech can speak, people unable to walk can climb
mountains, people with prosthetic limbs can run races; technology enables a deaf person to “hear”
the dialog spoken in a movie and a blind person to “see” the action.

I’m technology’s greatest fan. I use it to make sure I’m on the desired street, to read
books, to confirm that I’m grabbing the blue jacket rather than the identical pink one out of my
closet. My personal list of technology acknowledgements could fill pages, but sometimes, it’s
just a little scary.

Driving is the biggest obstacle for many people with disabilities. To work, go to school,
or just have a life, it is pretty essential to have some form of transportation.

In March, Nevada became the first state to license cars without drivers. The particular
car, a Toyota Prius outfitted with “brains” compliments of Google, has now logged more than half a
million miles without human hands on its steering wheel. (Instead, as seen in a YouTube
video, the “passenger’ in the driver’s seat can eat a taco, read a book, or do something else more
productive.)

Most accidents are caused by human error, so the idea of a car whose decisions are determined by
the information gleaned by lasers and sensors has definite appeal.

Similarly, the breakthrough in January 2011 in Daytona Beach, Fla., when a blind man drove,
without assistance, on the speedway, demonstrated the notion of designing a vehicle that could be
driven with nonvisual input.

But this week I learned of a new driving project that is just plain asking too much of the
human-technological interface.

Via infrared sensors, the car’s computer is designed to respond to facial expressions.

Wink to play the radio. Raise your hand to turn on the air conditioning. Gesture as
though lifting a telephone handset to make a call. Tilt your head left to make a
turn.

Not sure where the logic is in this one. To issue gestures of such a subtle nature, a
driver would still need to be entirely focused on the activity of controlling the car. Thus
texting, emailing, consulting a map, or applying makeup would be the same potentially devastating
distractions they are now.

Even scarier is the fragile connection between a tiny human gesture — wink, blink, nod — and the
computer’s ability to interpret it. Raise your hand to scratch your nose and the car thinks
you want more air. Nod to the beat of your favorite tune on the radio and the computer thinks
you want to stop.

Tilt your head to the left to shake your earring into place and the car “thinks” you want to
increase the volume on the radio.

Hundreds of projects involving the wonders of technology are conjured by graduate students and
engineers around the world every day. Once in a while, one is brilliant and changes
lives. Some, though, are just quirky and need to be abandoned.

Deborah Kendrick is a Cincinnati writer and advocate for people with disabilities.